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[Ganthan]

Hi guys.  I'm still quite new to DF and started up a new fortress using 40d11 called Stakebridges.

I tried to find the most newbie friendly map I could when embarking and found a spot that's heavily forested, borders a mountain, is warm and calm, has a brook, black sand, and a dolomite layer.  The brook also has the funniest name I've ever seen a random name generator produce: Womenfame the Organization of Dumps.  By an astonishing coincidence, 6 out of my 7 starting dwarves are female.

My dwarves, calling themselves The West Pick, had the following skills:

1 Wrestler, 3 Judge of Intent, 3 Appraiser, 3 Organizer:     My leader
1 Wrestler, 5 Mining, 4 Siege Engineer:
1 Wrestler, 5 Mining, 4 Siege Operator:                           My miners/siege defenders
1 Wrestler, 5 Grower, 4 Herbalist:                                   My food producer
1 Wrestler, 5 Mason, 4 Stonecrafter:                              My rock recycler
5 Weaponsmith, 5 Armorsmith:                                       My military supplier
5 Shield User, 4 Axedwarf, 1 Woodcutter                         My guard/starting logger (also my only male)

Everybody except the smith has Novice in at least one military and civilian skill.  I declined the smith because I wanted to get a head start on obtaining Masterwork weapons/armor.

My embark goods are 2 dogs, 2 cats, 2 copper picks, 1 steel battle axe, iron anvil, and assorted food, drink and seeds.

Things are going fairly well.  I have a farm producing plenty of food, food storage with kitchen and still, bedrooms 10 z levels below the surface so the dorfs won't be disturbed by the woodcutters, a dining hall and basic workshops(carpentry, masonry and craftsdwarf).  Everybody is in an ecstatic mood and I'm working on basic walls around my entrance.

I'm a little concerned because I've reached the first summer and haven't found any metal yet.  Swimming in dolomite, trees and sand, though.  How soon before some unpleasant nasties show up and how best can I prepare for them?  I wouldn't want my first caravan or migrant party to get ambushed and me with no way to defend them.  Should I have embarked with some metal bars?

[NecroRebel]

If you've played the newer versions (31.0x and related) at all, that may be why you're thinking you haven't found much metal, as veins are vastly more common in the new version than in the 40d series. On the other hand, combat in general is also far, far easier on your dwarves than the new version, so you shouldn't be in trouble.

You probably won't have any attackers come save a couple of kobold thieves who don't fight before the second summer, if not later. You're almost certainly going to have a migrant wave before then, so just draft 2 of the migrants who don't have useful skills, make a barracks someplace, and leave those two wrestling. They'll quickly skill up, and the two of them together with your woodcutter/axeman and miners will probably be able to take out the first goblin ambush wave without losses (unless the ambush squad is archers, in which case you're more-or-less screwed). For extra preparations, you could buy some leather when the dwarven caravan comes and turn it into leather armor, helmets, leggings, boots (preferably high), and shields, roughly in that order of priority, and equip your soldiers with them. The shields in particular help survivability, but seem to hurt offensive power of wrestlers, so they're lower-priority than ther other armor sets.

Also, if you do a bit of digging through the dolomite, you might find magnetite clusters. Each of these will turn into hundreds of iron bars, which you can then turn into steel with the dolomite and wood-burned-to-charcoal, which will provide adequate metal supplies for a long time.

[alexwazer]

It is usually recommended to drop the picks and axe if you embark with an anvil (before 0.31 anyway) or to bring only 1 pick. Taking a few metal ore or bars and making the weapons on site is much more effective point-wise. However, since your fortress is already running fairly well, it isn't really an issue I guess.

It's hard to know when to expect nasties as it depends on both you created wealth and the distance the goblins have to travel. Considering you have no carpenter/mechanic/architect/cook/engraver, your stonecrafter probably spent most of his time doing masonry and you didn't find any metal, I would think your created wealth should still be relatively small and thus I wouldn't expect goblins ambushes for a while. That being said, losing migrants isn't a big deal and caravans can usually take care of themselves (except elves... but seriously, who cares?). Anyway, if migrants get ambushed, there is relatively little chance your military would be able to help before they are killed unless you have champions running faster than cheetahs. However, if you are worried about your fortress, build some traps in your entrance and chain a cat/kitten/dog/puppy to "detect" ambushes (usually by being cut into pieces). Cage traps are boringly effective and stonefall traps are good enough for small ambushes, so I wouldn't bother with more than that at the start.

I am rather surprised you didn't find any metal ore since sedimentary layers like dolomite are usually rich. You should do some exploratory mining (different ways to do so). There isn't much to worry about however: in 40d, a single champion wearing worn socks, a copper helm and a silver mace can decimate a siege worth of non-ranged goblins without a scratch. You'll probably want to start your military with marksdwarves anyway (which do fine with wooden crossbow/bolts) to counter the goblins archers/marksgoblins.

[Ganthan]

Does the material of shields have any effect on their defensive quality?  Should I just make them all out of wood?

[Rvlion]

However, if you are worried about your fortress, build some traps in your entrance and chain a cat/kitten/dog/puppy to "detect" ambushes (usually by being cut into pieces).

I tend to use the "spoilered" setup for my "animal early warning system" and in 40d it has not failed me yet.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Code: [Select]

...Outside...
.............
%%%%%...%%%%%
  %R#...#R%
  %%%ttt%%%
    %ttt%
...Inside....

... : Floor
%   : Wall
#   : Fortification
R   : Restraint / Chain
t   : TrapsOnly it is smart to place only male animals locked inside that small chamber. Forgot to check one day and took a random dog... Few months later it was not only that dog, but also 5 puppies and getting those out while keeping the female in her place can be tricky. Very often I get the below coded situation...

Code: [Select]

...Outside...
.............
%%%%%...%%%%%
  %R#...#d%
  d%%...%%%
    %...%
...Inside....

d   : DogPlacing Cage/Weapon traps further inside the fortress past the fortifications would improve the defences even further.

[Z1000000m]

Does the material of shields have any effect on their defensive quality?  Should I just make them all out of wood?

the material of the armor makes a huge diffrence

i honestly dont know for sure if that applies for shields as well, but its a safe assumption that it does